Dunhuang

This article about Dunhuang was quite long, and to be honest I was forced to skim over it due to my courseload this week, so this blog entry will not be as detailed as the rest. I apologize. Okay. Now, on the the entry.

As I read the first page of this, I realized that I had actually heard of this cave of 1000 Buddhas before, and always dreamed of going to see it, but never could remember where it was located, so that was a fun little fact to begin with. It was interesting to know that over the years these caves have been continuously re-painted over and over up until the mid 1300's, and that people only really re-discovered it and began showing interest in the late 1700's. With a marvel such as the many caves, one would have thought there would have been attention much earlier then that. Then there is the cave 17, which is referred to as a library. It had many untouched bound scrolls that were probably hidden in order to protect them, and when they were found, they held many interesting things like letters which can now be read today. These caves are a fascinating as they contained things also like sculptures, a pair of slippers and other things that are rare to find, and yet, in these majestic caves, there was a wealth of history, to help us imagine what life may have been like. It is unlike almost any other site, and still continues to be a valuable place for archaeologists today.

Who was the Buddha?

The Buddha is most well known for his leading role in the religion Buddhism, but how much do we really know about the man behind the mask? The real life Buddha that lived over a thousand years ago? Not a whole lot is known, but there are basics about his life and what he carried out throughout it before reaching enlightenment. The Buddha himself was born into royalty, an Indian prince by the name Siddhartha Gautama, who lived in late 500 B.C. and grew up in a small kingdom with his father, as his mother had dies giving birth to him.

He stayed in this life of luxury for quite a while, but wanted more out of life and left the palace to learn the ways of meditation and the teachings of certain teachers. He stripped himself of all his material possessions to live as simply as possible and then agreed to become a teacher to the people, teaching about the overabundance of greed and hate within humanity. A few years later, after practiced deep mediation and such, he attained what is known as the enlightenment. He began his proper teachings after this, including what is known as the four noble truths and Dharma. (Both of these shall be further explained later on)

The Buddha lived a long and fulfilling life, never limiting his teachings to just a certain group. All were welcome and many learned of his beliefs. After he died, he is said to have entered into Parinirvana, the final stage of death where the body is abandoned and no re-incarnation occurs.

Buddhism is now the fourth largest world religion and is entirely based upon the teachings of the Buddha. Although it varies greatly depending on which form of Buddhism you look at, all are based on the same general teachings and all originated from the original Buddha himself.

The Ultimate Question

What is religion? This is a burning question that has been haunting not only scholars, but the minds of many people for years. How does one define religion? And how is it possible for their only to be one true definition of such a complex concept? The truth is there is not only one way of looking at this question, as many have found. Some have tried approaching it as though religion were an object to be picked apart and wanted to find what function religion actually served in society and to people. These were the functionalists, and their approach was popular for quite some time, but it failed to address the actual beliefs themselves and why some people acted so drastically in the name of religion.

I found this debate quite interesting, though there was a whole lot of reading and I did have to go back on some ideas more then once. I had never actually thought of the potential problem in trying to define religion....all I thought of was maybe a dictionary definition and that it involved worship of one kind or another. Apparently it is a much larger, tougher question then I had made it out to be, and has yet to be solved.

The first method used by scholar I believe have already mentioned and that is of functionalism, and there is no effort to look at anything in a religion aside from it's "purpose", meaning how it fulfills a person or manages structure in society. Essentialism is the group that will classify and group certain characteristics and behaviours and group them together, and that in the end, most of them will share the same characteristics with only a few differences. But therein lies yet another challenge. Which differences do you compare it too? General similarities and differences? Differences from Christianity? Differences from Hinduism? Or contrary. which do you set as the prototype to compare with? It is these issues that cause a break in agreement between scholars.

I believe that perhaps a solution to this problem would not to use a prototype, but maybe to just compare basic actions that are common in all, like some have already done. Nothing more and nothing less. It is not pertinent to get too specific like saying "all religions have a god" as this is not true. That is merely true for MOST religions, but not all. If one wants to try categorizing religion, they must be completely unbiased and not try to base of the religion they see as the "best one to use".

This is a problem, as there IS no true middle ground. You are pretty much religious or you are not, and thus are forced to see it from the side you know, and can never be without bias, no matter how hard you try. What I think can be done about this then is take opinions from both sides and try to combine them into one, so we can see the views of both right next to each other combined into one.

I shall conclude this with my own personal definition of religion. It is a complex gathering of people who share similar views with each other and unite alongside one another to "voice" this. As the views differentiated along the years, the groups still maintained basically the same beliefs, but the differences were great enough that they did separate. I do realize that this veiw is extremely simplistic, and perhaps even naive, but that was how I viewed religion up until now. I do hope that in taking classes such as these that I can expand my definition of the true meaning of religion. I know this is not a very good explanation, nor will it probably be agreed with by many, but the subject is so controversial and complex, that a conclusion will probably never be reached in the end.

Sogdiana: Art and Archetecture

The Sogdian empire played an astonishingly large role during the beginning ages of the silk road. I call it astonishing because I had, shamefully, never even heard of Sogdiana before reading about it, and it turns out their diplomats backed the trade negotiations, thus being very important to all business there. Funny thing was though, they were neither a powerful state, nor closely allied with any other kingdoms, but they were one of the most advanced. They were best known for their Silk during this time, but they were much more then just influential on the Silk Road. They were an advanced state, and had large cities designed in ways that had not been seen elsewhere before.

Although the housing started off fairly simple, detached, single story houses, but then, as a few centuries went by, the houses grew more and more complex, so that by the eighth century, multi-story houses were seen. I find this interesting, because not may would think of then simple townspeople housing to be up to three stories, especially in houses made of mainly mud and clay. This is quite an achievement for this time, as multi-story houses were not normally seen, especially other then in the Palace, even if the palace was more then one level itself. And then I read how by this time, one in three houses had personal murals on their walls. This was mainly for the wealthy, but if one in three had murals, it is plain to see that Sogdiana was doing well at this time. These murals were seemingly important to the people, as they showed everything from Gods to daily life, and this art seems to bear similarities to various other countries outside of China, but blended it with their own unique style. It's amazing how much information one can pull out of a single painting, and as there were so many murals, there is a lot of information to be had, but unfortunately, what is hard to say is what religion these people followed. There were so many different depictions that is can be said that there was probably a medley of religions within the community, thus the many different religious art pieces and painting seen throughout the cities.

I found this society interesting because it was so different from all the others, and yet it still managed to thrive on it's own. It was not powerful, it had no real allies, and yet it ended up controlling a large part of the Silk Road. It's art is numerous and probably could be seen everywhere back when it thrived. I can picture the large murals adorning the walls of many a house, which is, again, a rare thing to see during this time. Usually the murals were reserved for royalty and the very high ranking alone, but here, many could enjoy it in places other then just the temples.

Sogdian Mural

What is Historical Writing?

Not really knowing the true meaning of historical writing, I shall present you with my own opinion on what it is. Historical Writing, in my humble opinion is a recollection of a historical event, described in a detailed and explanatory way. This means that the writer must be both precise in their choice of details on the subject they are writing on and also must have a background description of why the event they are describing had occurred in the first place. However, the writing may not be written in detail only if it is thorough, covering all the important points, and as said before, stating the background info as to why these events ended up occurring.

The Hou Hanshu is regarded as historical writing, and in a sense, this is true, as it was written way back in the 5th century, but can it be considered a true historical writing under the criteria I gave for what a historical writing is? Honestly, I have to say no.

The Hou hanshu, while it was WRITTEN in the past, is far too jerky and reads kind of like a shopping list of events, where the happenings are just 'things' and didn't really happen, didn't really involve real people, and never fully gave the details of the events. Point form documentation. It seemed to only focus on numbers of people, the distances places were from one another and how kings and lords betrayed each other, which usually ended in a beheading.

For it to be a true historical writing, more depth could have been gone into. Such as what the people were going through because of some of these kings, and the writer could have sounded like he actually cared about what he was writing, instead of it seeming like something that could have been thrown together in half an hour.

The ethnographic descriptions. That's the word I was looking for, and forgot to mention it before now. These were what made me feel so disconnected with the writing. I felt like it was more like a math text then a historical one, and I found myself not caring at all about what was being said, as the author didn't seem to care either. I know I am repeating myself here, but it is very true. If you are going to write something, especially something about your past, one should put more care and detail into it, in order to provoke more understanding about what it was really like to those readers of the future.

Blog Entry #1 Response

The Silk Road. The very name conjures up brilliant imagery of vibrant colors, exotic lands and merchants bustling to and fro selling many unique and rare artifacts to the travellers from Europe. No doubt the media has played a major role in implanting these ideas into our heads, as The Silk Road in itself, was not really a real road, nor was it as cheerful and bustling as we may think.

The "road" itself stretches many thousands of miles from Europe to the very farthest reaches of China, and later involved using waterways traversing around the edges of the land, where ports were created in order for more efficient trading. But why did this all happen? And why did the once flourishing trade dwindle and die, only to be resurrected centuries later in a manner that was more downright stealing on the Europeans part, as opposed to trade?

The demand for silk grew early on, and the Romans were especially demanding of it, as both sexes wore it and greatly enjoyed the light material, but as demand grew, so did the prices, but still it was worn by every class, except now it was worn by women only, as men were forbidden from wearing it.

Silk was not the only thing for trade...jewels, artifacts, spices and gold were also available, but to get to these wonders, it was a dangerous journey that cost many lives. It was trecherous, the Taklamakan Desert, and was known for it's vast and terrifying sandstorms, which were said to burry entire caravans. But still people pressed onwards to get these glories of the East and bring them home, and vice versa.

This road also carried a new religion over to China: Buddhism, and slowly but surely, it took hold in China...one of the only foreign religions to make it there, and stay.

But with the collapse of the Tang Dynasty, the silk road slowly began to dwindle, and by the Ming dynasty in the mid 1300's, it pretty much died off completely as China isolated itself.

What really amazed me about this was how China could have so easily abandoned this prosporous trade. They were obviously doing well, and as they abandoned it, they fell into a decline, so one might think that they might want to re-open this trade and reclaim some of the prosperity they needed during this time.

They lost so much, and the abandonment caused many legends and stories to pop up, and these stores seem to have been ignored up until the mid 1800's where certain early archaeologists begin to peak an intrest in it, and this led to may problems. Many of those who went looking ended up killed, and others ended up scamming or being scammed with lies about what they had, or just plain faked thier finds.

I think it's amazing what people will do to eachother just for a little bit of fame, and the lengths they will treck for wealth. It was a dangerous mission on the road, and yet thousands trecked on it. It died, but came back, and now it is dead again, replaced by a real highway.

The signs of a long forgotten trail are still laying around however, being burried by the sands, waiting to be found, and once again reclaimed.